Yep, That's all the 'fine art' market is. Its nothing but a way for rich people to exchange and launder money. It has never been shut down because most people don't realize this and corrupt politicians use it.
Seriously, that fits with the apparent fact that the art world is controlled by a very small number of wealthy dealers. You will never succeed in the art world unless you get discovered into one of their galleries.
It's difficult to fully explain the modern and fine art market - but the pieces are basically poker chips. They're a token for the exchange of shadow goods and services. It's way of banking huge amounts of money without leaving a paper trail. They perform the Service, and acquire the Token, then after a few years, they put it up for auction and the anonymous buyer pays $22M. The 22M is for the Service, not the Token.
> The International Monetary Fund estimated that “the amount available for laundering through the financial system” was worth 2.7 per cent of global gross domestic product in 2009 or $1.6-trillion (U.S.). The relative ease of laundering illicit funds through art dealers and auction houses is thought to have contributed to the spectacular rise in the value of fine art in recent years.
> From the way I understand it art and art forgery is an easy and old money laundering operation and scam. Paintings are cheap to make, maybe $500 or less, so the art is made cheap and quick and is bought cheaply by an "investor" from the artist, then a "critic" talks up the artist (both are usually a member of the communist party) and his work so the art is deemed "important" as "socially conscious" even if it's crap, and then it is sold at a high price to a foreign buyer also of the communist party or just some dupe, the money is kicked back to the artist through group "endowments" (often government endowments or endowments established by communist party leaders a hundred years ago) and through individual "patrons" that support the artist. Because an actual item was purchased large amounts of money can be shifted from one person or country to another and the money is "clean." And so politicians and crime lords can use the art community as a way to move large sums of money around.
Real art has value but it isn't worth millions of dollars. It just isn't. Especially not modern art and that's what is usually being sold for lots of money. And from my research it seems that forgeries can be more profitable than modern art. A decent artist makes a copy of an old piece or something like one he's seen so it that would qualify as a newly discovered work by an old artist, and art "experts" are called in to verify it, those experts are paid off to verify the work, and "official" art catalogs of old artists are forged and inserted into old libraries so the books look like contain a record or photo of the work as having existed, and those books and experts are used to grant legitimacy to the piece, the stamps and stickers from auction houses can be forged or somebody there can be bribed to stamp the piece so that it looks like it's passed through legitimate sale through auction houses a long time ago, and somebody is sold a fake piece, or maybe even with their knowledge just so the piece held onto for a while and then sold for big profit to a dupe. YouTube has documentaries about John Myatt case and Eric Hebborn and "hot art" that explains how it's done. Word has it Myatt's partner was using their scam to raise money for OPs, but that was never confirmed.
Regarding this point -
> And from my research it seems that forgeries can be more profitable than modern art. <
See this recent Vanity Fair article: "The Art Market’s Modigliani Forgery Epidemic" - May 2017
He is the artist behind 6 million dollar solid gold toilet that was stolen. I'm guessing this is kick backs from him helping steal it or him laundering the stolen gold himself.
Let's just take it on face value for a minute. I know it's hard, but suspend all logic and reason for a minute and indulge me. If ultra rich oligarchs can afford to drop $120,000 on a fucking banana taped to a wall, it would indicate that our society is at a precipice. I'm not one to tell people how they should spend their money, but for fuck's sake, if you have that much money to burn, there's a lot of good you could do with money you're just pissing away on bullshit. You know, helping your fellow man...like these elitists always tell us we need to do more.
Now, back to the real world...You're absolutely right. Ultra-rich, ultra-corrupt people legitimizing their ill-gotten gains in plain sight. It's the only logical explanation.
If the money is being laundered it’s not because it’s wasted money. It just needs to move somewhere without anyone seeing it.
It may be going to help save lives or blow things up or buy a Lamborghini. No one knows and that’s the point.
It definitely smells like money laundering, not just moving money without people knowing, but getting dirty money into our banking system (washed/ becoming legit). Sometimes the banks are in on it too, especially some foreign banks like HSBC, Deutsch Bank and UBS.
I've seen UBS statements of a 30 yo woman showing two $750m incoming wire in the same day. That's $1.5 billion same day cash transfer to a young woman! How crazy is this.
It’s about getting anonymous funds from God knows where into the right hands and cleanly into the US banking system.
Laundering money 101: it’s all about getting dirty money into the system, the rest of it (lost value, etc) doesn’t matter.
I work in finance and we see people try to take out $1M accounts with 10% early termination penalties (designed for institutions and VERY long term investors) and they will turn around and happily try to withdraw the funds a day later losing $100k. It’s all about getting the initial funds in the channel. Luckily, it rarely happens because we have safeguards....
Let's say he helped in the theft of his 'gold toilet' stolen awhile ago. He needs to get paid.
Thieves buy his bananas for 120k each.
Or, forget the theft, let's just say it is pure drug money. Drug dealers buy bananas for 120k each. The dirty drug money is now the artist's clean money. To get it back to the thieves, they use similar techniques to get the money back to the dealers.
These are just over simplified examples. Money launderers generally have fairly complex setups. It's all about having the money go through one or several legit businesses sales [the more there are the harder to track]. You might only end up with 50c on the dollar of clean money, but it's clean money.
This is a very simple explanation which is easy to follow. But wouldn't there be any track where the artist received the money from? Or is the where the complications of the system comes in?
You move dirty money in with good. It's not like the person buying the art is a known drug dealer - they have a legitimate source of income as well so that buying things doesn't raise flags. The goal is to use clean transactions to make it more trouble to untangle than its worth.
Yep, That's all the 'fine art' market is. Its nothing but a way for rich people to exchange and launder money. It has never been shut down because most people don't realize this and corrupt politicians use it.
Seriously, that fits with the apparent fact that the art world is controlled by a very small number of wealthy dealers. You will never succeed in the art world unless you get discovered into one of their galleries.
It's difficult to fully explain the modern and fine art market - but the pieces are basically poker chips. They're a token for the exchange of shadow goods and services. It's way of banking huge amounts of money without leaving a paper trail. They perform the Service, and acquire the Token, then after a few years, they put it up for auction and the anonymous buyer pays $22M. The 22M is for the Service, not the Token.
Article from 2015 in Canada's top newspaper:
> The International Monetary Fund estimated that “the amount available for laundering through the financial system” was worth 2.7 per cent of global gross domestic product in 2009 or $1.6-trillion (U.S.). The relative ease of laundering illicit funds through art dealers and auction houses is thought to have contributed to the spectacular rise in the value of fine art in recent years.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/international-business/european-business/economists-urge-tighter-regulations-to-curb-money-laundering-in-art-market/article26217852/
COMMENT:
> From the way I understand it art and art forgery is an easy and old money laundering operation and scam. Paintings are cheap to make, maybe $500 or less, so the art is made cheap and quick and is bought cheaply by an "investor" from the artist, then a "critic" talks up the artist (both are usually a member of the communist party) and his work so the art is deemed "important" as "socially conscious" even if it's crap, and then it is sold at a high price to a foreign buyer also of the communist party or just some dupe, the money is kicked back to the artist through group "endowments" (often government endowments or endowments established by communist party leaders a hundred years ago) and through individual "patrons" that support the artist. Because an actual item was purchased large amounts of money can be shifted from one person or country to another and the money is "clean." And so politicians and crime lords can use the art community as a way to move large sums of money around.
Real art has value but it isn't worth millions of dollars. It just isn't. Especially not modern art and that's what is usually being sold for lots of money. And from my research it seems that forgeries can be more profitable than modern art. A decent artist makes a copy of an old piece or something like one he's seen so it that would qualify as a newly discovered work by an old artist, and art "experts" are called in to verify it, those experts are paid off to verify the work, and "official" art catalogs of old artists are forged and inserted into old libraries so the books look like contain a record or photo of the work as having existed, and those books and experts are used to grant legitimacy to the piece, the stamps and stickers from auction houses can be forged or somebody there can be bribed to stamp the piece so that it looks like it's passed through legitimate sale through auction houses a long time ago, and somebody is sold a fake piece, or maybe even with their knowledge just so the piece held onto for a while and then sold for big profit to a dupe. YouTube has documentaries about John Myatt case and Eric Hebborn and "hot art" that explains how it's done. Word has it Myatt's partner was using their scam to raise money for OPs, but that was never confirmed.
Regarding this point -
> And from my research it seems that forgeries can be more profitable than modern art. <
See this recent Vanity Fair article: "The Art Market’s Modigliani Forgery Epidemic" - May 2017
http://www.vanityfair.com/style/2017/05/worlds-most-faked-artists-amedeo-modigliani-picasso
This explains the mystery of all the crappy artwork today. Pizzagaters did deep dives on this.
It was going dark. He had to eat before inedible.
Really an environmental move.
His turd will sell for double that amount
Now you're thinking with portals
Should have taped the peel back up to save money.
He should have made it into banana bread
He is the artist behind 6 million dollar solid gold toilet that was stolen. I'm guessing this is kick backs from him helping steal it or him laundering the stolen gold himself.
ART!
Modern "Art": where you can literally sell just a white canvas for like several million dollars.
The "source" of that $120K is probably... YOU!
Let's just take it on face value for a minute. I know it's hard, but suspend all logic and reason for a minute and indulge me. If ultra rich oligarchs can afford to drop $120,000 on a fucking banana taped to a wall, it would indicate that our society is at a precipice. I'm not one to tell people how they should spend their money, but for fuck's sake, if you have that much money to burn, there's a lot of good you could do with money you're just pissing away on bullshit. You know, helping your fellow man...like these elitists always tell us we need to do more.
Now, back to the real world...You're absolutely right. Ultra-rich, ultra-corrupt people legitimizing their ill-gotten gains in plain sight. It's the only logical explanation.
I don’t understand your point.
If the money is being laundered it’s not because it’s wasted money. It just needs to move somewhere without anyone seeing it. It may be going to help save lives or blow things up or buy a Lamborghini. No one knows and that’s the point.
Hey but dont worry they can get that banana back in about a day or so...
Ha Ha. The curator said it's "the idea of the banana" not the actual banana that is worth 120k.
Then what do they need the banana for?
It definitely smells like money laundering, not just moving money without people knowing, but getting dirty money into our banking system (washed/ becoming legit). Sometimes the banks are in on it too, especially some foreign banks like HSBC, Deutsch Bank and UBS.
I've seen UBS statements of a 30 yo woman showing two $750m incoming wire in the same day. That's $1.5 billion same day cash transfer to a young woman! How crazy is this.
I wonder how much an AR-15 "hook-and-loop-fastenered" to a wall would bring.
Bingo
Wait. How can he launder it? The art is gone and can’t be re-sold?
It’s about getting anonymous funds from God knows where into the right hands and cleanly into the US banking system.
Laundering money 101: it’s all about getting dirty money into the system, the rest of it (lost value, etc) doesn’t matter.
I work in finance and we see people try to take out $1M accounts with 10% early termination penalties (designed for institutions and VERY long term investors) and they will turn around and happily try to withdraw the funds a day later losing $100k. It’s all about getting the initial funds in the channel. Luckily, it rarely happens because we have safeguards....
Could be a pay off for services.
Let's say he helped in the theft of his 'gold toilet' stolen awhile ago. He needs to get paid.
Thieves buy his bananas for 120k each.
Or, forget the theft, let's just say it is pure drug money. Drug dealers buy bananas for 120k each. The dirty drug money is now the artist's clean money. To get it back to the thieves, they use similar techniques to get the money back to the dealers.
These are just over simplified examples. Money launderers generally have fairly complex setups. It's all about having the money go through one or several legit businesses sales [the more there are the harder to track]. You might only end up with 50c on the dollar of clean money, but it's clean money.
This is a very simple explanation which is easy to follow. But wouldn't there be any track where the artist received the money from? Or is the where the complications of the system comes in?
You move dirty money in with good. It's not like the person buying the art is a known drug dealer - they have a legitimate source of income as well so that buying things doesn't raise flags. The goal is to use clean transactions to make it more trouble to untangle than its worth.
Yup.
'Stolen' art also acts as currency on black markets. Once an object has a valuation, it can be used in leu of cash, usually in massive amounts.
DING DING DING DING!
Guys, I'm a millionaire, I have about 15 bananas in my home
The art world is a money laundering scam.
That guy's a hero.
Seriously, give him a gun and a badge.
If they could duct tape diarrhea to the wall, it too could be called art
Money laundering or a tax dodge. At least for me, that explanation fits so much better than much of this modern "art" being that valuable to someone.
It's damn near impossible to tell reality from parody these days.
I thought that was Yang for a moment...
Could also be insurance fraud, since it got eaten. If the buyer had insurance on it..
Excellent observation - note Podesta's interests in the art markets...
post modern art is bullshit
? TIL
?
Suddenly U.S. Secretary William Cleary's son Todd, in Wedding Crashers takes on a whole new depth. "Jeremy tried to seduce me."
An Asian guy hahahaha they are cucks!! You would never see a black man doing "art"